Author Archives: dallas

About dallas

Made some games. Lots of games.

Update of the Avatar #140 – 2015.08.28: SotA Included in Syndicate’s Guinness World Record, Play R21 Now!, New Team Members, End-of-Summer Telethon, and More!

August 28, 2015

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

Syndicate Includes Shroud of the Avatar in Guinness World Record
Player Owned Towns: The Syndicate’s Arx Draconis
Play Release 21 Now!
R21 Patch Notes
New Dev Team Members
Very Large Creatures: Dragons (Work-in-Progress)
Highlights of New Use Based System
New Pledge Rewards
End-of-Summer Telethon In Just 3 Days
3 Day Countdown for 10% Summer Bonus & Reward Expirations
Streetlamp Decos
New Dyeable Hats
Koldar’s Trading Card Giveaway
In-game Community Weekend Events
Upcoming Events
Recommended Games to Back

The Syndicate Includes Shroud of the Avatar in Guinness World Record

We can’t begin to describe how excited, and honored, we were when Sean Stalzer, head of The Syndicate Guild, informed us that they had their Guinness World Record updated to include Shroud of the Avatar! Here’s an excerpt from the Official Guinness World Record website:

First founded in February 1996, The Syndicate had been active for 19 years 170 days, as of 20 July 2015. The Syndicate prefers to only take part in a limited number of games at any time and is currently focused on Ultima Online, World of Warcraft and Shroud of the Avatar. Additionally, they have been prominent in titles such as Star Wars: The Old Republic and EverQuest. The guild is known for its motto “Long Live The Syndicate”, often abbreviated to “LLTS”.

Their site can be seen here: http://www.llts.org/

Our deepest heartfelt thanks to Sean and the entire Syndicate for including Shroud of the Avatar in their prestigious world record!

LLTS!

Release 21 Instructions

August 26, 2015

[A SotA Public Forum post by Starr Long]

Greetings Avatars,

Please read this entire message, as well as the linked instructions and known issues.

Thank you for being a loyal backer and follower of Shroud of the Avatar. Release 21 access for all backers at First Responder level and above begins this Thursday, August 27 at 10:30 AM Central Time (16:30 UTC).

It has been a truly amazing and humbling month. Our community believes in us so much that we have managed to raise over seven million dollars to date! To celebrate, we are having an all-day telethon on Monday August 31 from 10:00 AM to 10:00 PM Central Time (16:00 UTC to 04:00 UTC). The telethon will be hosted by members of our community and include deep dives, Devs vs. Players PVP, Devs vs. Players Gustball, and hourly prize giveaways! We will be posting a detailed schedule this Friday, so stay tuned.

Release 21 contains a lot of new content, but the largest change is a fundamental shift in how advancement works. After many hours of gameplay, more hours of internal discussions, even more hours of digesting player feedback, and even more hours of design, we have decided to move to a Use-Based System for advancement; which replaces our current leveling and skill point allocation system. Trainers must still be visited to unlock abilities, and abilities are still arranged in skill trees, but all skill advancement now comes from use. The more you mine, the better you become at mining… and the more you swing your sword, the better you become at sword swinging. We did not make this decision lightly and it came at the cost of slightly delaying some other features, but we firmly believe this makes the game fundamentally better and more in line with our statements of this game being a spiritual successor to the Ultima games. Please note that the next several releases will involve a lot of rework and balancing to get this working properly with all of our skills. Also expect us to rearrange skill trees multiple times to make them work better with this new system. For now, expect some oddness and skill arrangements that might not make sense in the current system (although they made sense previously). Also we know that we need to better deliver information in the game about the way the system is working. You can find and discuss more details about our current design thinking about the Use-Based System implementation in this forum topic here.

While we are getting closer to launch, we are still in a constant state of change, and we do not yet have in-game systems to inform players of these changes, or to share ways to help them to explore new content and systems. This means we rely entirely on this message, and the linked instructions and known issues to convey the current game state. We regularly have to answer questions or filter bug reports because some players elect not to read this valuable information. By taking a few moments to read through this information, a great deal of our time and efforts can be redirected to focus on new “unanswered” questions, and addressing critical issues impacting each release. We greatly appreciate you taking the time to review this post, and for all the truly valuable feedback you continue to provide.

Also, remember that while we are providing new content with each release, our community is working overtime to make new events for you to enjoy. So, be sure to check out a couple of the Community Events Calendars run by our community members (via in-game book or the player run websites Avatars Circle Community Events and Events of the Avatars calendar).

Without further ado, here are the R21 deliverables.

Update of the Avatar #139 – 2015.08.21: Dragons WIP, R21 Dev+ QA, Trolls Invade BMC Debate, Use Based Systems Part 2, Decorating Hometown, Snowy Mountain Template, Obsidian Fence, and More!

August 21, 2015

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

Very Large Creatures: Dragons (Work-in-Progress)
Early Dev+ Release 21 Testing
Trolls Invade the BMC Speaker of the House Debate
Let’s talk about… USE BASED SYSTEMS! Part 2
End-of-Summer Telethon
Hometown: Parade of Homes (and basements)
Player Owned Towns: Snowy Mountains
Obsidian Stone Fence
10 Day Countdown for 10% Summer Bonus & Reward Expirations
Darkstarr Reward Delivery and Airship City Home Limited Availability
In-game Community Weekend Events
Upcoming Events
Recommended Games to Back

Very Large Creatures: Dragons (Work-in-Progress)

Geoff Mellon (character artist), Kevin Wells (character artist), and Bren Wilson (animator) are working on our next Very Large Creature: Dragons! Check out these work-in-progress images:

Darkstarr Reward Delivery and Airship City Home Limited Availability

August 17, 2015

0 Days Until Darkstarr Reward Delivery

Greetings Avatars,

The Darkstarr rewards, available to backers that have a pledge dated prior to July 31, 2013, are expiring after August 31, 2015. All backers that are eligible for any of the four Darkstarr rewards will have those rewards delivered to their account following August 31. They will be listed on your profile account page, similar to the manner in which any Add-On Store items you may have purchased are displayed. The Darkstarr rewards include:

All Tiers ($25 and higher) – The Darkstarr Salute! A special emote that only backers can master and teach to others.
Founder Tier ($65 and higher) – The Darkstarr Cloak! A special cloak for your in-game avatar to wear, proudly displaying the unique Darkstarr symbol, identifying you as a backer of the game.
Virtual Collector Tier ($110 and higher) – The Darkstarr Metronome! For those of you planning to play virtual instruments this mechanical metronome could be very useful! Set this in-game decoration next to your instrument and turn it on!
Citizen Tier ($550 and higher) – The Darkstarr Moondial! A special in-game, yard decoration which will track the heavens day and night! Very useful when planning strategies in-game, as astronomical events which drive some story aspects will be easily determined with this device.

Once those Darkstarr rewards have been distributed to the eligible accounts, they will no longer be associated with specific pledges and cannot be transferred automatically if a pledge is sold or gifted to another account.

If you were thinking of upgrading your pledge to receive any of the rare Darkstarr rewards, you will need to do so by end of day August 31, 2015, after which they will no longer be available.

Airship City Home Limited Availability

When we announced the Airship City Home in Friday’s weekly update, you may have noticed that it was priced at a premium well above the average cost of homes in the Add-On Store. As such, it was not intended to be included as one of the Add-On Store House Selections on the Player Owned Town Submission Form. It was brought to our attention that it was inadvertently included in the submission form menu, so we had it removed this weekend.

As a premium home, the Airship will only be available through the Add-On Store. Our apologies for any confusion this may have caused.

Update of the Avatar #138 – 2015.08.14: Desolis Underground Part 5, R20 Postmortem, Novia Circa 1977, Use Based Systems, Highwayman Hat, Airship City Home, and More!

August 14, 2015

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

Architecture of the Obsidians, Part 5: Desolis Underground!
Hangout of the Avatar ~ Release 20 Postmortem
Novia – Circa 1977
Let’s talk about… USE BASED SYSTEMS! Part 1
Release 21 Grand Tour Quest Reward: Highwayman Hat
SXSW Panel Picker
Airship City Home
Last Weekend for Obisidian Tower 1/2 Off Sale
17 Day Countdown for 10% Summer Bonus & Reward Expirations
3 Day Countdown for Pledge Splits & Merges
In-game Community Weekend Events
This Week In the News
Upcoming Events
World Builder/Level Designer and VFX Artist Job Openings
Recommended Games to Back

Architecture of the Obsidians, Part 5: Desolis Underground!

Update of the Avatar #137 – 2015.08.07: More Designers, Desolate Hills, Desolis Underground, Snowy Mountains Player Town, NPC Name Requests, Hometown Island, and More!

August 7, 2015

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

New Designers Join SotA Dev Team
Desolate Hills on the Perennial Coast
Architecture of the Obsidians, Part 4: Desolis Underground!
Thou Art Invited to Hangout of the Avatar ~ Release 20 Postmortem
Player Owned Towns: Snowy Mountains
NPC Name Submissions Requested for Desolis!
Hometown: Parade of Homes
24 Day Countdown for 10% Summer Bonus & Reward Expirations
10 Day Countdown for Pledge Splits & Merges
In-game Community Weekend Events
This Week In the News
Upcoming Events
World Builder/Level Designer and VFX Artist Job Openings
Recommended Games to Back

New Designers Join SotA Dev Team

For the past several months we’ve been searching for world builders to help us crank out more content, as well as game system designers to help flesh out some of our systems. Our search has been fruitful and we’d like to introduce you to three recent additions to our Shroud of the Avatar team:

Update of the Avatar #136 – 2015.07.31: Play R20 Now!, Role-Players of the Avatar, Player Owned Towns, Fan Updated Trailer, Battle Banners, Obsidian Towers, and More!

July 31, 2015

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

Play Release 20 Now!
Role-Players of the Avatar
Shroud of the Avatar Trailer (Fan Updated)
Player Owned Towns, Island Template, Editor, & Dara Brae
Battle Banners, Obsidian Towers (oh, and Outhouses)
Tower Home Renovations
31 Day Countdown for 10% Summer Bonus & Reward Expirations
17 Day Countdown for Pledge Splits & Merges
In-game Community Weekend Events
This Week In the News
Upcoming Events
World Builder/Level Designer and VFX Artist Job Openings
Recommended Games to Back

Play Release 20 Now!

Avatars Radio FireLotus Release 20 Party hosted at the estate of Goldenwing Okhan in the Player Owned Town of Radio City. Check out more screenshots in the Release 20 Screenshot Gallery.

Release 20 Instructions

July 29, 2015

[A SotA Public Forum post by Starr Long]

Greetings Avatars,

Please read this entire message, as well as the linked instructions and known issues.

Thank you for being a loyal backer and follower of Shroud of the Avatar. Release 20 access for all backers at First Responder level and above, as well as attendees of Classic Game Fest, begins this Thursday, July 30 at 10:30 AM Central Time (16:30 UTC). If you signed up at Classic Game Fest for weekend access, please be sure to create an account on our website as soon as possible in order to gain access for the weekend.

This continues to be the most amazing community I have ever worked with. It also continues to be the most amazing process of development I have ever experienced. We are truly co-developing this game together in a completely transparent and iterative process, and it is humbling and thrilling all at once. Thank you so much for supporting us with your funding, your content submissions, your community run events, your suggestions, and of course your critique. You make this project possible, and you are making it better.

Release 20 is probably one of the biggest releases we have made so far. It includes a wealth of new content that gets us that much closer to Alpha. The Troll expands our ability to support very large creatures, and therefore, more thrilling combat. That thrilling combat is expanded with Taming, allowing players to harness the power of wild animals. And the creativity of our players will certainly shine in Player Owned Towns, thanks to the incredibly flexible Dynamic Lot Placement tool. The Player Driven Economy is also taking real shape as we push more content towards crafting and away from Merchant sales, while at the same time providing Player Owned Vendors for pledge holders.

We know many of you have been waiting for more visible focus on the story versus the simulation. As we have said before, we have to build the entire simulation first and then put the narrative over that foundation, so the story has had to wait until that time. And we know that the length of time it has taken us to reach that stage is frustrating for many of you; and we completely understand! We are frustrated too!

The good news is that we are now within sight of the time which story progress can begin in earnest. Now, the only remaining issue is creating the spaces for the story to happen in, and that is why you have seen us ramp up hiring. For R20, we focused our story energies on the Tower of the Shuttered Eye. We hope that the mystery, challenge, and detail there will reflect well on how we want the whole game to be.

Also, remember that while we are providing new content with each release, our community is working overtime to make new events for you to enjoy. So, be sure to check out a couple of the Community Events Calendars run by our community members (via in game book or the player run websites Avatars Circle Community Events and Events of the Avatars calendar).

Without further ado, here are the R20 deliverables.

Update of the Avatar #135 – 2015.07.24: Obsidian Architecture – Desolis Underground, Trolls, Tantalus Consortium, Player Owned Town Editor, GameFest, Plant Decos, and More!

July 24, 2015

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

Architecture of the Obsidians, Part 3: Desolis Underground!
Very Large Creatures: Trolls in R20
The Tantalus Consortium
Player Owned Town Editor Video
Last 3 Days of Rize Up’s Batten Disease Charity Drive
Lord British and Lord Blackthorn Keynote CGF2015: Ultima Online Postmortem
Plant Lovers Delight!
Free Domestic Shipping at Relics by Rild
38 Day Countdown for 10% Summer Bonus & Reward Expirations
24 Day Countdown for Pledge Splits & Merges
In-game Community Weekend Events
This Week In the News
Upcoming Events
World Builder/Level Designer and VFX Artist Job Openings
Recommended Games to Back

Architecture of the Obsidians, Part 3: Desolis Underground!

[This is a continuation of A Dev+ Forum Post by Scottie Jones]

Hello all! I’m so glad you’ve been enjoying this work in progress. Having crafted some of the last of my planned Obsidian-Architecture-specific objects, I’m now beginning the actual layout of the areas I’m responsible for building. Lord Tachys asked about level design choices in general, and I’ll be addressing some of that (at least for this specific area) as I show you some of the first area layouts. The last items I wanted to make, before creating the various areas in the Desolis Underground scene, were three different types of magical lighting used by the Obsidian lords.

Update of the Avatar #134 – 2015.07.17: Batten Disease Drive, Obsidian Architecture, Pledge Merge/Split Countdown, NBNN Interviews Starr, Tantalus Town Guide, Trees, and More!

July 17, 2015

Greetings Fellow Avatars!

Here’s what we have for you in this week’s edition of Update of the Avatar:

Architecture of the Obsidians!
One Month Countdown for Pledge Splits and Merges
Do you have a Public Cache Chest Quest?
NBNN Interview With Starr Long
10% Bonus on Player Owned Towns & Capping Overland Map Access to 230 Towns
Tantalus Consortium Visual Guide to Player Owned Town Submission Form
45 Day Countdown for 10% Summer Bonus (Now including Player Owned Towns) & Reward Expirations
Community Sponsored SotA Con at Gen Con 2015!
Batten Disease Charity Drive by Rize Up Gaming
Koldar’s Trading Card Giveaway
The Kobold Mask 4-More Pack
Tree Lovers Delight!
In-game Community Weekend Events
Upcoming Events
World Builder/Level Designer and VFX Artist Job Openings
Recommended Games to Back

Architecture of the Obsidians!

[This is a continuation of A Dev+ Forum Post by Scottie Jones first reported in Update #132]

Having created the primary building blocks for the large outer walls, I’m now moving forward with sets of smaller items I can use to decorate the scenes I’ll later be creating, and that others can use to add hints of Obsidian architecture to regions of the world that may have been touched by them. Here we have a set of items I’ve already determined we need based on some simple sketches I did for the Chamber of Souls.

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